University of Southern California
DAILY ® TROJAN
VOL. LXII NO. 22 LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 22, 1970
TRUSTEE JOHN McCONE (LEFT) SPEAKS TO STUDENT QUESTION
Trustees. Norris. Marshall. Horton. Shumway.Salvatore, Firestone and Fisher listen at _forum yesterday_
University funds misuse charge leveled at Hurst
By PETER WONG
A complaint which seeks the removal of ASSC President Sam Hurst was filed yesterday with the ASSC Student Court
Sophomore Mike Trope, who filed the complaint, charged that Hurst “used" university funds for his election campaign and that he ignored the interests of the student body.
Trope, who is chairman of the internal research committee for the ASSC Academic Affairs Council, charged Hurst with arranging the speaking engagement of Jerry Rubin last spring to coincide with the ASSC runoff election which Hurst won.
Hurst and Jeff Ullman. his roommate and a member of the Vietnam Moratorium Committee, planned that Rubin's talk would attract potential Hurst supporters to vote in the election. Trope claimed.
The $1,200 of ASSC funds for Rubin's appearance should be charged to Hurst's campaign expenditures. Trope said, which would place him over the $200 campaign limit and dismiss him from office.
When contacted last night, Sam Hurst answered Trope's charges:
“If Michael Trope has concerns about the rationale for bringing Jerry Rubin to campus, I suggest he contact Fred Minnes, now a first year USC law student, and read the records of last year s executive council. The Rubin appearance was a result of executive council action in accordance with their rules and regulations and
I	had nothing to do with it.”
In Trope's second charge. Hurst was accused of ignoring the student body by his appointments from his own political faction.
“This is clearly exemplified by the choice of students for yesterday’s ‘University Forum' — students from his clique,” Trope said.
Appointments to university committees have also been made in violation of established procedures, he charged.
Hurst's response to the question of representation:
“With regard to selections for today’s panel, the group that stimulated today's student-trus-tee convocation, the Caucus of Concerned Students, is not a broadly representative group of the student body.
“In fact, they represented concerned students who were interested in articulating the problems in contemporary educational philosophy and, in particular, the relationship of trustees to students. It was with this understanding of the nature of concern that I selected the panel.’’
“I am attempting to have Hurst recalled or dismissed from office, because I am morally convinced that he manipulated university funds for his own political ends,” Trope said.
If the court does not handle his case, or if it hands down an unfavorable decision. Trope plans a recall movement, predicting that he would get the necessary signatures of 10 per cent of the student body within three weeks.
CASES TERMED ‘EXCITING’
Behavior unit will meet
By BOB DOERSCHUK
On Thursday. Oct. 29. the Committee on Student Behavior will meet to consider whether it has the authority to consider what Dr. Terry Poiin. the committee chairman, called “two exciting and unprededented cases.''
The first one. submitted by three law students on Oct. 12. concerned the right to have religious tracts handed to them on campus by a non-student.
The second is the controversial ASSC suit involving administration policy towards student political activities.
Both cases are unprecedented at USC. because they are suits brought against the administration by members of the student body.
In every other case, the administration has served as the plaintiff and the student body members have been the defendants.
“We have no formal grievance procedure for this situation.” Dr. Polin said. “If the
student has a legitimate grievance, where can he seek redress?”
“Because of this unusual state of affairs, the committee agreed to conduct hearings for the purpose of establishing whether we have jurisdiction to hear this case. Dr. Polin added.
The results of the hearing will be forwarded to President Hubbard, who will approve or reject them.
“The university president has never overruled any of the prior decisions of this committee.” Dr. Polin said. He also pointed out that Dr. Topping had held that position during almost all of the committee's existence
The Student Behavior Committee is composed of three members of the faculty, chosen. Dr. Polin said, “through faculty systems,” and three students selected by ASSC president Sam Hurst.
“1 have no concerns about any of the members. Dr Polin said. “I have questioned them all in regard to any possibility of partiality. "
Board meets with students
By RIVIAN TAYLOR Associate City Editor
The question of student representation on the Board of Trustees was sharply focused upon as students and members of the board finally got the chance to have a dialogue at yesterday's University Forum. 1
Even a bomb scare in Bovard Auditorium, the primary site of the convocation, could not force another postponement as the program moved to the steps of Von KleinSmid Center where 14 trustees and a crowd of about 1,000 students wrestled with their respective concepts of the board and its function.
Students raised questions of their rights to have a voice in the selection process of trustees.
Trustee John McCane said the basic responsibility of the board is to create and maintain an institution which will make the students leaders in times to come.
Justin Dart, chairman of the board, in outlining some criteria for board membership, said a trustee should be an individual who has distinguished himself in his own profession and who was wealth or access to wealth.
With a grin on his face, he said, “The three commandments for trustees are give, get or get off.”
Dart said he opposed student membership on the board because he didn't feel students had adequate experience.
“The students, I thought, came to USC to learn, not to remodel the university,” said the president of Dart Industries. “Wisdom in part comes from experience. You don’t get your experience all in a bunch as a freshman, or sophomore, or junior, or senior.”
Dart also said he opposed student or faculty membership because of conflict of special interests.
“The board is primarily a lay board which represents the interests of the university, not any one interest.” he said.
“If we put a student or faculty member on the board, it is bound to result in a pull for this or that interest. We try to act as an impartial arbiter for distribution of funds within the university.”
Trustee Leonard Firestone said he would accept a student member if he were representative of the student body.
There seemed to be some disagreement over the concepts of communication and process. The trustees, while generally rejecting the idea of student representation on the board, pointed to student representation on the Academic Affairs and Student and Alumni committees as communication processes which have been installed and are functioning.
After Sam Hurst, ASSC president, asked Dart to assume the responsibility to try to formally bring the student body into communication with the administration and trustees. Dart replied:
“Students are formally represented on two committees. You have just got to believe and know that these processes are functioning and I don’t care who says they aren't.''
Later during the program, Hurst said, “The student body president is prostrate before administration. The greatest communication we could have right now is to say that there is no communication. We have to build it on something real.”
But not everyone in the audience was behind Hurst at this point nor were they throughout the program.
The plan for the convocation called for a Great Issues Forum setup, with a panel of students and a panel of trustees engaging in dialogue and then an open question and answer period.
Dart told a group of students standing outside a convocation planning meeting two weeks ago that he had ample confidence in Hurst to select a forum panel of five students.
Several students said the student panel was not representative of the student body in that it did not include any moderate or conservative students.
When a question was addressed to Hurst on this matter and on the manner of Hurst’s selection process, Denny Thomson, a panel member, said:
“At the meeting we had. we agreed that the panel would be representative in educational philosophy. There is a black student, a graduate student, undergraduate students and a woman on the panel.
“There are no VIVA members, no YAF members, but I think you ought to look at it in this sense: Quit being parasites.
“If you want to do something then it is your obligation and responsibility to structure it. But when the Caucus of Concerned Students attempts to bring about a convocation, all of a sudden right wingers and moderates come out of the walls asking to participate.
A good number of those attending yesterday's convocation applauded the event, the first dialogue between the board and the students, as a good exchange of ideas.
Not all the questions from the audience could be answered and Dart promised any questions written to the board would be answered, published and distributed to the students.
But not all were satisfied with the day s events. Panelists Miles Mitchell and Thomson responded to their program with a parable:
“There was once a village plagued with many evils. Always beneath the village smiles there were secret agonies. But there were those who knew that there was another way.
“With an even deeper pain, those who knew discovered that most of the village was incapable of sensing another way at all. Sometimes with patience, sometimes with desperation, those who knew beseeched the rest of the village to listen.
“Almost no one heard. It was awkward. But still they try.